Photo: Ella in Life Beautiful with a lovely smile
Ella, a second year student of Marine Sciences, was allegedly drugged by a family friend last week Tuesday. PUNCH METRO gathered that the drug, suspected to be a sleeping tablet, put the girl to sleep and she never woke up..
PUNCH METRO gathered that efforts made by her friend to revive her failed. She, however, died at the Lagos Univesity Teaching Hospital where she was rushed to.
The Dean of Students Affairs, Prof. Olukayode Amund, told PUNCH METRO that he got a report that a girl living in the institution's Moremi Hall had died. However, he added that the circumstances of her death were yet to be known.
He said, "The girl was a student of Marine Sciences and the Head of Department confirmed it. She was allocated Moremi Hall and for now we have collected her contact address and her telephone number. Once we receive a coroner's report, the school will know what step to take."
He said that that the initial report brought to him was that Ella went out with her boyfriend and was later taken to LUTH by the boyfriend before she died in the hospital.
But an official in the Dean's office, who craved anonymity, said that Ella's parents had alleged that their daughter was poisoned. The official said the parents claimed that the man responsible was not her boyfriend but a neighbour, whom she had not seen for a long time. The parent added that both decided to take a drink and she later died after taking the drink.
But Almund said that since the university was not responsible for the girl's death, it would not pay any compensation to her family. "But she might be entitled to insurance claim if she registered for the school's insurance scheme, which students were advised to do," he said.
He advised students to stay under the protection of the university. "What we do is to counsel students, we don't nag them because we are dealing with adults. They can make a choice whether to stay under the protection of the university or to go outside the protection of the University of Lagos," he said.
Spokesman of the state police command, Mr.Frank Mba, said he was not sure that police had received a report of the death. But our correspondent gathered that Ella's parents and the university were waiting for an autopsy report before making a formal report.
Although our correspondent made strenous efforts to obtain the telephone numbers of Ella's parents from the UNILAG Public Relations Officer, Mr. Dare Adebisi, and the late undergraduate's friends, he was unsuccessful.
Repeated calls to Adebisi's number were not answered. A text message was also not replied.
Additional report: Lekan Ibrahim.
